Saturday, 25 December 2010

In total contrast to yesterdays' day of art and cultural learning, today we are acting totally out of character for us and spending the day at Disneyland Resort, Tokyo. A totally childish and indulgent way to be spending Christmas...

Packing out fast with people, children incredibly excited, lots of character hats on heads, and the smell of pancakes, popcorn and possibly chips in the air....

Below: a video of some of the characters performing with an audience of children (and us). Check out the rather enthusiastic child who keeps bobbing up every now and then - very into it!

Below: some photos taken whilst watching the Disney parade [yes - we actually stood and watched the whole show!, it was incredibly cold (about 9 degrees) with a very chilly wind as Disney is built on the coast]:

Not part of the parade - Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee were at the exit to wave us off.

Bev - before purchasing the glittery black furry Mickey hat c/w mouse ears - out of necessity as was starting to get chilly round the ears (well, that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it!). Meanwhile, back to the parade...

Photo opportunity stand

The Disney Palace

You'd be proud of us.... We did several rides including the Roger Rabbit toon town cars, the 'Lovely World' boat journey, Canadian canoeing, Mississippi boat ride, and a 'Stitch' light show with animated birds, flowers, and totems. May have done more if the queues hadn't been absolutely horrendous - but then - it is Disneyland, what do you expect!! A colourful and musical day; I can understand why kids would get hooked.

Left Disneyland at around 3.45pm having started to get extremely cold and numb, and nipped back to Mangia Mangia for a nice Christmas dinner of pasta, and bottle of vino! The Manager remebered us from our first visit and came to ask how we were enjoying our stay - he explained that at Disney - there are actually two resorts: Disney Land and Disney Sea. Obviously we know about Disney Land; Disney Sea is apparently a more adult targeted resort (whatever that means - faster/bigger rides maybe?). He also felt it necessaary to tell us that this Sea resort sells alcohol!!! Have we got a reputation from drinking just one bottle of wine with a meal?

Finishing off the lovely day by doing some more laundry!! Merry Christmas Everybody...

Christmas Eve and we've a day of Culture booked by way of a Kabuki performance; an art form of acting where masked faces give emotion by way of voice intonation, and very little, slow movement is made.

Slight blip on the metro this morning - found ourselves in the 'Women Only' carriage - OK for me, but not so for Col; realising our error, we apologised profusely and moved up a carriage asap before Col got himself arrested! Maybe there is an element of truth in the Tour Guide book rumours of perversion during rush hour?

Off we went to the National Noh Theatre to collect our tickets, waited around until 30 mins to spare, then found out at the information office we were actually at the wrong theatre.... PANIC...... £50.00/ticket and we're about to miss it!! Dived into the first taxi we could flag down and zoomed off to the other side of town to the National Theatre Japan - 5 mins to spare before the performace started - phew..... Honestly, how were we to know that the Kabuki performance wouldn't be held at the Kabuki Theatre?

Above: picture of a typical Kabuki character - one of the scary, meaner ones!

Below: a photo of the National Noh Theatre - which we should not have been waiting at!!! P.S. If you look closely, you may spot a rare sighting of Col in a photo...

You're not allowed to take photos inside the Theatre once performing has started; a shame, because the costumes were really fantastic, and the face make-up for the masked appearance was incredible. It should also be noted that the performers do not line up and take a bow at the end - I was hoping this would be my opportunity for a costumed photo, but it didn't happen. Below is the stage area.

It has to be said, the show was absolutely amazing, and certainly an experience not to be missed. The storyline is one of loyalty, disloyalty, love and sacrifice'. The fight scene was particularly interesting - I've never witnessed such an inactive fight, where the samurai waved his hand (almost) to knock over the marauding enemy (who were fighting with bunches of flowers)..... and went on for 5 hours!!!!! This was after they skipped Acts 1 and 2 at the beginning, just giving an introductory write-up in the theatre guide, started at Act 3, summarised Acts 5 and 6 by way of a story-teller, then again skipped Acts 8, 9 and 10 before going to the final Act 11. Also, each Act contained a number of different scenes and background changes. They perform different schedules of the Acts on different performances. Strange how it still managed to make sense (sort of) to a non-Japanese speaking visitor. Admittedly, there were three breaks, and had we known how long it lasted, we probably wouldn't have rushed so much to not miss the opening!

The Theatre itself was an impressive building, with a really beautiful, art-filled interior. The lights were like dandelion heads once turned to white puffs, but made of crystal for the ultimate shine and glitz. I should also mention the heated seat toilet/bidet - totally unexpected!

Once we'd had our fill of Japanese culture, we made our way to a 'trendy wine bar' for a bowl of pasta; then off into town where we found a Tokyo take on the Hard Rock Cafe. Had to go in just out of curiosity really....

The Staff were great.... really into the Christmas spirit. Stayed for a couple of bottles, then off home (absolutely reeking of an ashtray - smoking is still allowed over here - hadn't realised how quickly we'd got used to the ban). Needless to say, I was slightly merry, but Col got us back safely...

Elvis wannabe....

[Below: Col was very polite and only photographed the top half of this Santa's helper - they seemd to be wearing indecently short serving outfits; felt embarrassed for the staff who had to keep taking meals upstairs!!]

HERE WE GO TO TOKYO

Hi Everyone, It's finally happening ... we're off to Tokyo !

The day has arrived, we're being picked up tonight by a taxi at around 1am and down to Heathrow. The weather has been threatening to cock everything up all week, but fingers crossed we should be ok ... as long as the airport know how to deal with Ice & Fog :-|

We're going to write this blog every day and hope that you will visit regularly and check out the sights and sounds of Tokyo. We're taking camera's & sound recorders and we plan to make video's for Youtube etc .... SO KEEP COMING BACK !